1. Chapter 10
Campaigns
and Elections

2. Campaigns and Elections
Campaigns are the mechanism through which candidates for political office attempt to persuade individuals to vote for them on Election Day. Electoral rules affect how and where candidates campaign, which means some groups of potential voters receive much more attention from
candidates than others.

3. Warm Up Referenda or initiatives Open versus closed primaries
Caucuses v primaries
Straight-ticket option
Plurality vote

4. Elections in America
Presidential elections: held every four years on the first Tuesday in November
Congressional elections: held every two years on the first Tuesday in November
Midterm elections: those congressional elections held in years without a presidential election
State and municipalities often hold elections on the same date as national elections, but do not have to.
Responsibility of administering and managing election process (not campaigns) rests with the states, usually the state secretary of state.

5. Elections in America: Who Runs Elections?
Who runs elections in America?
Constitution gives power to the states
Usually run by local governments
Overseen by state regulators
States have control over their elections, but the Constitution also says that Congress shall be “the judge of Elections, Returns and Qualifications of its own Members.”

6. Types of Elections Four types of elections: Primary General Runoff
Referenda or initiatives

7. Types of Elections: Primary Elections
During these elections, parties choose candidates who will run in the general elections
Open versus closed primaries
Primaries versus caucuses
Primaries seem like private events, since they are internal to the respective political parties.
The Supreme Court has determined that parties serve a public and, indeed, quasi-government purpose, so their primaries fall under election law.
There is a lot of video where students can see the difference between a caucus and a primary.

8. Types of Elections: General Elections
Determine who gets to hold office
Typically draws the most voters, especially in presidential election years
There is much more national mobilization and awareness about general election (presidential specifically) candidates and issues, and hence, higher turnout.

9. Review 1 Name 3 kinds of elections Define majority
Define special majority
Define plurality
What do call elections held years when there is presidental contest?
List 3 kinds of direct democratic election processes.

10. Types of Elections: Direct Democracy
Legislative referenda: all 50 states’ legislature refers policy to the public for a popular vote
Popular referenda and initiative: 24 states, citizens petition to place issues on the ballot for a vote
Bypass the legislature
Often controversial and/or expensive policies
Recall elections: 18 states, citizens vote to remove elected official from office
1. A wide range of issues are up for consideration.
2. In 2008, Massachusetts voted on: a) banning dog racing b) decriminalizing possession less than one ounce of marijuana, and c) ending the state income tax.
3. California recalled Governor Davis (who lost his seat); Wisconsin recalled, but failed to remove (as the majority has to support) their governor in 2012.
4. Some issues legislators don’t want to deal with because they are divisive, or too expensive to support—they are politically dangerous to their career prospects.
Two excellent resources on this topic are: and

11. Criteria for Winning
Plurality vote: the candidate with the greatest number of votes wins
Most American elections are plurality vote
People often win with far less than 50 percent of the vote
Majority vote: to win, the candidate must receive more than 50 percent of the vote
If no one receives more than 50 percent there will be a runoff
Very rare in America
Students can look up many other races; when viable independent or third-party candidates run, this happens most often. Some examples aside from those mentioned above: Texas’s Governor Rick Perry in 2006 and former Governor of Arizona Janet Napolitano in Students should easily be able to locate more.

12. Ballots States decide which type they will use.
State ballot variations include:
Straight-ticket option on ballot
Party affiliations not listed
Ballots available in multiple languages
Voting machines, paper ballots, punch cards, touch screens, mail only
Students might wonder if any of this matters, and it turns out that it does. If one actually watches votes being tallied, one sees many paper ballots being disqualified on technicalities such as circling the name instead of placing a check mark, or voting for multiple candidates for the same office. One also sees irregularities because paper ballots can be confusing and people cannot figure out how to vote for their desired candidate.

13. Electoral Districts
The drawing of electoral districts is always a matter of controversy, with opponents accusing one another of “gerrymandering”—drawing district boundaries in such a way as to serve a particular group’s interests. The original gerrymander was a districting plan attributed to the Massachusetts Governor Elbridge Gerry (1744–1814) that had the shape of a salamander.
Three types of gerrymandering
Packing: ramming many voters of one party into a district to dilute their votes in other districts.
Cracking: tearing up dense pockets of party voters to dilute their votes in that district.
Stacking: merging two districts of the same party to force incumbents to run against each other.
An excellent example of these three is located at:
Students can run through the idea conceptually, then apply different partisan, ideological, and racial/ethnic scenarios to think about how it works.

14. Electoral Districts: Redistricting
Redistricting: legislative districts redrawn every 10 years
Who draws districts?
Varies by state: legislatures, nonpartisan committees, bipartisan committees, courts, panels, and so on
Most districts gerrymandered to serve someone’s interest:
Party or partisan gerrymandering
Incumbent protection
Redistricting is the result of a state law in each state, and states are not bound to redistrict only once every 10 years. Texas redistricted after a Republican took over the statehouse in 2002 in order to give the GOP more seats.

15. Electoral Districts: Fundamental District Criteria
Court’s fundamental district criteria for congressional districts:
Contiguous
Compact
Consistent with existing political subdivisions
Race can no longer be the deciding criterion.
Minority-majority districts often occur by way of residential patterns and population distribution
Students can look up congressional districts and their corresponding racial-ethnic composition.
A demographic map (a New York Times interactive application ideal for this task, located at: will suggest where minority-voter interests are likely represented no matter the representative’s background because of his or her vote share in the district.

16. Presidential Elections
Parties make their primary rules, frequent changes
Parties select their presidential candidates by delegates sent from each state.
GOP: winner-take-all; DEM: proportional
Primary season is earlier each election.
States earlier on calendar are more influential
Mastering the primary schedule and system at the state level can be an important element to winning the nomination.
The Obama 2008 and Romney 2012 campaigns used information about these details to their advantage in order to win their nominations.
Students can learn more about the math of the primary process by doing a few state case studies for each party.

17. Presidential Elections: Contemporary Party Conventions
Mnemonic : RED P
Ratify the decisions made in primaries
Enact any new rules for future delegate selection
Draft party platforms
Present candidates and party platforms to voters
The last point needs to be emphasized. Even though virtually every state will have held primaries (late ones often do not matter), many citizens pay little attention to elections until the conventions. Therefore, what is said and done matters greatly because it is often the first time many voters see and hear about the candidates and their views.

18. Presidential Elections: The 2012 Primaries
Several Republicans vie for party nomination
January field included: Bachmann, Cain, Gingrich, Perry, Romney, Santorum
May: Romney effectively wins nomination, all others drop out of the race
Democrats did not have a primary
Sitting presidents rarely challenged in modern era
Time is a significant advantage incumbents can use to organize and mobilize their campaign while the opposition party is still determining their nominee. In this case, the presidential reelection campaign began battleground-state operations in 2010.

19. The Electoral College
State electoral votes = number of U.S. representatives + senators (two)
All states but Maine and Nebraska allocate all electors to the popular vote winner.
Whoever gets a majority of electoral votes wins the election.
If no one gets a majority then the House decides the vote, with each state getting one vote.
Students can look up the Maine and Nebraska process; many find it an interesting alternative, especially for noncompetitive states.

20. The Electoral College: Butterfly Ballots
Some of the devices that have been used to record votes in the United States are notably prone to errors that can affect election results. For example, in 2000 in Florida’s Palm Beach County, some voters were confused by the “butterfly ballot,” which made it difficult to match candidates and votes. In the 2008 elections, many of the nation’s voters cast their ballots on electronic touch-screen machines. Critics of touch-screen voting systems, however, question the machines for their accuracy and security against fraud.

21. Election Campaigns
Candidates start a campaign by raising money by either:
Forming an exploratory committee
Filing papers announcing candidacy
Campaigns are about how politicians run for office
Strategies depend on office, party, candidate, contemporary issues, electorate, technology
Candidates select their own staff, raise almost all of their own money, and some even shy away from their party affiliation if they are in the minority in their district.

22. Campaign Organization Chart
It may be worthwhile to break this apart and walk through the different elements.
National candidates spend most of their time traveling, conducting interviews, going to public events, and fund-raising.
They do very little of the work that is required to run the organization; it is a huge undertaking with thousands involved at different levels.
FIGURE 10.1 The Typical Organization of a National Political Campaign

23. Election Campaigns: Advisers, Fund-Raisers, and Polling
Professional strategic decisions about organization, budgeting, executing the campaign
Fund-Raisers
Identify donors, find allies for indirect spending
Polling
Test ad messages, find out what voters think of them and opponents (strengths and weaknesses), push polls
Campaign polls v public polls

24. Election Campaigns: Media
Strategic decisions: program appearances, spokespeople and campaign surrogates, message focus to convey to public
Prepare for high-coverage events like debates and conventions with extensive news coverage.
Rapid response teams to diffuse opponent attacks
Online: ads, fund-raising, event updates

25. Election Campaigns: Mobilization
Strategic decisions: where to invest money on advertising, number of candidate events
Collaborate with party, interest groups, state and local supporters online and in-person
Since 2008, significant mobilization occurs online where campaigns and supporters coordinate efforts and resources more efficiently.

26. How Voters Decide Three main factors Partisanship
Issues and policy concerns
Candidate characteristics

27. How Voters Decide: Partisanship
Most voters who identify with a party vote for that party’s presidential candidate
FIGURE 10.4 The Effect of Party Identification on the Vote, 2012
In 2008, nearly 90 percent of Democrats and Republicans supported their party’s presidential candidate. Should candidates devote their resources to converting voters who identify with the opposition or to winning more support among independents? What factors might make it difficult for candidates to simultaneously pursue both courses of action?
What the slide does not show is that about a third of voters do not claim a party affiliation, and between that and the voters who vote for the other party, there are enough voters in play in any election for either candidate to win.

28. Consumer Confidence and Presidential Elections
FIGURE 10.5 Consumer Confidence and Presidential Elections
Since 1968, the Consumer Confidence Index has been a reliable predictor of incumbents’ political fortunes. Was the result of the 2008 election consistent with this trend? What issues other than the economy influenced the 2008 election?
SOURCE: Bloomberg Financial Markets.
*Survey was bimonthly prior to 1977, so figures for 1968, 1972, and 1976 are for October and they are for September from 1983 on.
**Gore won the popular vote, but Bush was elected by the Electoral College.

29. How Voters Decide: Issue Concerns and Candidate Characteristics
Issues are relevant when candidates take different positions.
Campaigns highlight differences they think are most important to voters.
Candidate characteristics
Personality, career, perceived things in common

30. Sources of Campaign Funds
Campaigns are the mechanism through which candidates for political office attempt to persuade individuals to vote for them on Election Day. Electoral rules affect how and where candidates campaign, which means some groups of potential voters receive much more attention from
candidates than others.

31. Who Donates to Political Campaigns?
Political campaigns are funded in large measure by donations. In the 2012 election cycle, individual donations to candidates and campaigns totaled approximately $981 million. Over two-thirds of this amount came from small donations of less than $200 each.
The data presented here shows the demographic profiles of those who donated to a candidate, campaign, or political organization and those who did not.

32. Education and Family Income
Americans with some college education or a degree are much more likely to make a political contribution.
Americans with less disposable income obviously contribute less of their financial resources.

33. Age and Political Interest
Americans over 50 contribute much more than those who are under 50.
Finally, Americans who claim to have an interest in politics are more likely to donate. Remember, most contributions are less than $200.

34. Sources of Campaign Funds: Various Sources
Running for political office is expensive; money comes from:
Individual donors
Political action committees
527 committees
501c(4) committees
Political parties
The candidates themselves

35. Top Donors to 527 Committees, 2008
TABLE Top Donors to 527 Committees, 2008
SOURCE: Center for Responsive Politics, based on records released Oct. 21, 2008.

36. Public Opinion Poll: Q1
Do you think voters make decisions based on the influence of campaign ads?
Yes
No, people already know whom they prefer before seeing the ads. 36

37. Public Opinion Poll: Q2
The redistricting process is controversial and conducted differently in each state. Who should draw district lines?
State legislatures
Nonpartisan state demographers, using only population data and maps
A bipartisan committee of elected officials and public interest groups
Appointed bipartisan panel of state judges 37

38. Public Opinion Poll: Q3
Should the Democratic and Republican parties have a national primary to select their party’s presidential nominees instead of a state-by-state system?
Yes, one national primary would be better.
No, a state-by-state system is best. 38

39. Public Opinion Poll: Q4
Should there be limits on the amount of money candidates can spend on campaigns?
Yes No 39

40. Public Opinion Poll: Q5
Should we get rid of the electoral college, or change the way that it operates (using the Maine or Nebraska models)?
End the electoral college, and elect presidents by popular vote.
Change to a less rigid system like the one Nebraska and Maine have implemented.
Keep the current system in place. 40

41. Additional Information
Following this slide, you will find additional images, figures, and tables from the textbook.

42. Crowded City Street
Elections are the most important way that Americans participate in politics. Some of the rules for American elections have been in place since the Founding, while others have evolved over time. This painting shows Election Day in Philadelphia in 1815.

43. The 2012 Primaries and Caucuses Calendar
TABLE 10.1
The 2012 Primaries and Caucuses Calendar

44. Iowa Caucus Voters
Iowa caucus-goers were the first to vote in the 2012 presidential primaries. The United States is one of few nations in the world to hold primary elections and caucuses.

45. Romney and Ryan, 2012
Although the party’s nominees for the president and the vice president are “officially” announced at the party conventions, they are actually
selected much earlier through caucuses and primary elections. In 2012, Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan formally accepted the Republican nomination at the national convention.

46. Supporters of Popular Vote
Replacing the electoral college with the popular election of the president would have a significant impact on how campaigns are waged.
Presidential candidates would have a greater incentive to campaign in large population centers, like San Francisco and Houston. Opponents worry that less populated rural areas would be ignored.

47. Romney and Advisers
Candidates for national office hire professional campaign advisers to guide their campaigns and direct volunteers. Here, Mitt Romney collaborates with senior adviser Kevin Madden and chief strategist Stuart Stevens during a strategy meeting en route to a campaign event in Ohio in 2012.

48. Average House and Senate Campaign Expenditures, 1980–2012
FIGURE Average House and Senate Campaign Expenditures, 1980–2012
The average amount spent by House and Senate incumbents to secure re-election has risen sharply in recent years, whereas spending by challengers has remained more stable. What would you expect to see as a consequence of this trend? Is legislation needed to level the playing field?
SOURCES: Norman J. Orstein, Thomas E. Mann, and Michael J. Malbin, eds., Vital Statistics on Congress, 2001–2002 (Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute, 2002), 87, 93; and Campaign Finance Institute,

49. Electing the President: Steps in the Process
FIGURE 10.3 Electing the President: Steps in the Process

50. Romney Campaign Workers
Contemporary presidential campaigns gather large amounts of data on potential voters in order to effectively tailor campaign messages to specific
demographics. Armed with this data, volunteers for both the Romney and Obama campaigns made thousands and thousands of phone calls to urge individuals to support their candidate on Election Day in 2012.

51. How Presidential Campaigns Spent Money, 2012
FIGURE 10.4 How Presidential Campaigns Spent Money, 2012
Presidential candidates and the groups that support them spend nearly half of their money on advertising. However, advertising is not the only major expense. The cost of raising money is itself a major line item in the campaign budget.
SOURCE: Washington Post, /campaign-finance (accessed 6/4/14).

52. Campaign Laws in Comparison

53. Diagram: Who Donates to Political Campaigns?

54. Obama Isn’t Working Website
In 2012, the Romney campaign and other Republican groups attacked Obama’s handling of the economy. As a sitting president presiding over a
somewhat shaky economy, with unemployment uncomfortably high, Obama’s re-election was not a given. In response, the president pointed to the government’s investment in infrastructure, a policy he supported and that creates jobs, as well as economic indicators that were finally moving in the right direction

55. We Are the 47 Percent
Romney’s remark—made at a private fund-raiser—that 47 percent of Americans were dependent on government and not worth his campaign’s time offended many Americans. The issue highlighted the division of the electorate into “have mores” and “have lesses.”

56. The 2012 Presidential Election Results
FIGURE The 2012 Presidential Election Results
Barack Obama defeated Mitt Romney in the 2012 presidential election, winning 332 votes in the electoral college (62 percent of the total). The top map shows who won each state; there, red seems to dominate. However, if we adjust the map to show each state in proportion to its population, blue states—those won by Obama—clearly dominate.
SOURCE: Washington Post, .com/wpsrv/special/politics/election-map-2012/president/ (accessed 6/8/14).

57. Joni Ernst and Supporters
The 2014 Senate race in Iowa was a key success for Republicans. In a fierce battle with Democrat Bruce Braley, Joni Ernst won 52 percent of the
vote to Braley’s 44. National groups spent millions to affect the Senate race, making it the most expensive non-presidential race in the state’s history.

58. Smartphone Campaign App
The Internet is an increasingly important tool in fund-raising. Building on Obama’s success in raising money online in 2008, his 2012 campaign introduced a new iPhone app and other new tools for soliciting donations.